


Once and Future

by actualkoschei



Series: Fanfic Inktober 2019 [3]
Category: BioShock 1 & 2 (Video Games)
Genre: Backstory, Based off a dnd campaign, Canon-Typical Violence, M/M, Period-Typical Homophobia, There are two OMC/OMC ships in this
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-10-08
Updated: 2019-10-08
Packaged: 2020-11-27 07:55:03
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 898
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20944928
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/actualkoschei/pseuds/actualkoschei
Summary: Clarence has a type: pretty boys who attract trouble.For Inktober days 3&4: "bait" and "freeze".





	Once and Future

**Author's Note:**

> Again, for my boyfriend and my OCs from his Bioshock DND campaign. Sage is another PC from the campaign. Also, if you're in the campaign and you're reading this: it's free Clarence backstory.

Joseph’s  hands were warm like the ocean wasn’t. Nothing should be warm, out in the middle of a freezing rainstorm in the Atlantic Ocean. Clarence’s teeth chattered. He hugged a blanket around  himself and squeezed Joseph’s hand somewhere in the folds of s cratchy fabric, and pretended he wasn’t. 

Nobody would look at Clarence and think  _ queer _ . Proper Midwestern boy that he was, big blue eyes and curly brown hair and the broad chest and shoulders of a football player. He  _ had  _ been a football player, once.  Not so long ago, really, but it felt like another life, out here in the middle of the churning grey sea.

They might think  _ queer _ when they looked at dark , slender Joseph, though, and Clarence didn’t want to bring prying eyes down on him either. 

Not that eyes were prying, right then. The few others about were scanning the sea with nervous eyes. 

Joseph’s warm fingers reached out and brushed icy rain away from Clarence’s face. “You done good today.” He said,  with a smile warm and melting as honey. 

“Yeah?” Clarence smiled back, but nervous, and his chattering teeth bit his lip in the process. 

“Oh yeah.” He glanced around, and then leaned  in to Clarence. Their lips were but a breath apart, and then...

The whole ship rocked. Fire lit up the surface of the ocean. 

Joseph  screamed and scrambled up to his feet. “U-Boat!” 

Clarence wanted to say it couldn’t be. They’d be sinking, wouldn’t they... but then the ship rocked again, sickeningly. 

Someone wailed. A grown man, but he wept like a little boy. “Sinking! We’re sinking!”

Joseph grabbed Clarence’s hand through the turbulent darkness. “We’ll get through this, right? You and me. Promise.”

\------------

Percy was running ahead. He always was. Or, well, running was a relative term. He was teleporting, hither and thither.  Even Sage, sprinting after him with her skirt tangling around her legs, was  nowhere near keeping up. 

Clarence wasn’t running. His stride was long enough to almost keep up, and he didn’t see the point in losing air for nothing. Besides, watching Percy and Sage was something like entertainment, and that was rare enough down in Rapture. They seemed to be having fun. That is, Percy was shouting in the loud, incoherent manner of so many S plicers, and Sage was laughing. 

She was laughing, and Clarence let his guard down. He didn’t hear the creak of the vents, the footsteps that weren’t any of theirs, until a crowbar came crashing down across the back of his neck.  He grunted, the movement sending pain flaring across his still-healing cracked ribs, and doubled up. 

Percy stopped in shock. “Clarence!” A flare of emotion crackled through his voice.  “Ah well! Follow me, fuckers!” And then he was gone, then there again. Flickering, bright, and of course the Splicers chased him. 

Clarence couldn’t catch his breath. He strained and gasped, ragged, rubbing his chest. “Percy, wait!” He shouldn’t be afraid. But he was.  And he tasted blood, and his vision swam. 

Percy’s wasn’t fragile, he knew he wasn’t. But he  _ looked _ it, all long and skinny with his torn-up clothes. And he was going where Clarence couldn’t follow. Not like this. 

Sage was panicking, and her hands were full of fire. She was deadly like this, angry and full of fire, but she was still just a teenage girl.

Clarence finally sucked in a breath, and then another. He managed to straighten up then, and went pelting after them, ignoring the burn as he ran, a studded baseball bat clutched in his hand. 

He found Percy and the other Splicer behind the next door. The Splicer had Percy pinned down, tearing at him with a blade. Percy was fighting, giving it a good go, that had to be said for him. He’d done some damage, kicking and scratching with his inhuman long nails.  But there was blood on his face, and all over his shirt, nonetheless. At least some of it had to belong to the  _ other _ Splicer, but that did not make Clarence feel any better. In fact, it made him feel  _ worse _ , knowing he couldn’t tell just how bad Percy was bleeding. 

Clarence brought his bat down on the back of the Splicer’s head, a mirror of the energy the man had done him first. Once, twice, a third time. A fourth, and on and on until the man fell still. On top of Percy, regrettably.  Clarence hauled the corpse  off of him and tossed it aside like so much trash. Time was, he might have felt sympathy for the man. But that two wars, and indeterminate amount of time, and oh, too many years ago. He extended a hand to Percy instead.

The other man was breathing rough and ragged. When Clarence pulled him to his feet, he staggered, would have fallen if Clarence didn’t catch him. 

“Are you hurt?” The arm Clarence had around Percy’s waist didn’t seem to be enough to hold him up. The man was deadweight.

“What... do you think?” He gasped it out, through blood bubbling around his lips, then his knees collapsed.

Clarence swore, too loudly, and scooped Percy up into his arms, holding him bridal-style. 

Percy let himself fall  backwards, and grinned up at Clarence. “My hero!” His grin turned manic, then his eyes rolled back in his head, and he went limp in Clarence’s arms. 


End file.
